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“Come on, baby. You’ve gotta go in there,” Derek whispers in my ear. “Trust me, you’re going to regret it if you don’t.”
“I’m not strong enough,” I tell him.
“You are. You can do this. I will be right here with you.”
Emma and Brent are following everyone in. Emma looks back at me and pauses.
“I’ve got her, Em,” Derek tells her.
She watches for a moment, then makes her way into the room. I catch a glimpse of it and know that my dad is lying in a coffin in that room.
“Derek,” I breathe out, gasping for breath. “I don’t think I can do this.”
He takes me into one of the side rooms. I recognize it immediately as the room where the receptionist sits. I do my best to breathe and in and out.
“Here, sit.” He leads me over to the chair. “Now put your head between your legs and breathe.”
I do as he asks, and the world stops spinning. I can slowly start to breathe normally again. But the pain in my chest, the ache of losing my dad, is still there. Aiden suddenly comes bursting into the room.
“You okay?” He kneels down in front of me. “Let’s go do this together. I’m sorry I left you.”
I offer him a smile and accept his hand. He leads me into the room, and we say goodbye to our father. I see the arrangement that Serena sent immediately. I know all the ones with white and blue roses are from the family. That was our gift to Dad. But the lavish one that’s much larger than ours and has several different varieties of white flowers on it came from her.
“Make sure you get a picture of that and thank her on Instagram,” I snap at Derek.
He squeezes my hand and says, “I’m sure someone from her team already has a picture and will be posting. That girl’s all about her image. But let’s not worry about her right now
I don’t speak at the funeral. Instead, I stand by Aiden while he talks for both of us, his hand in mine the whole time.
“Our father was a great man. He was the cornerstone of our family. Everything he did was in service to my mom, my sister, and me. He made sure we had a great life and always took the time to be at our school events. Most parents wouldn’t approve of their son refusing to go to college to be in a rock band, but he did. I never once heard him tell me I needed a backup plan. Music is what I love, and my dad loved that for me. Follow your dreams, he’d always say. And I did. So did Audrey. We did it because he taught us it was okay to do so. So now we’ll go on in memory of him. Dad, we love you and we’ll do our best to honor you and your legacy.”
We head back and sit on either side of my mom.
“Beautiful,” she says, leaning over and kissing both of us. I love Aiden’s words, and I accept the praise from my mom, but I had nothing to do with any of it.
The rest of the funeral flies by in a haze. I keep one hand in my mom’s and one hand in Derek’s. When it’s finally time to say my final goodbye at the gravesite, I lose it. Derek has to hold me up as my body is racked by sobs. I don’t even care that there are a few camera crews who managed to find our location. I still broke, and I couldn’t care less that it was caught on camera.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
We arrive back home, and everyone heads out to the back deck to sit around the portable fire pit we got Mom and Dad a few years back. The guys are still in their dress shirts, their ties and jackets long gone, while Mom, Emma, and I are in comfier clothes. It reminds of me of the night we spent in Corolla. Instead of having my dad here, we have Aunt Ellen.
I sigh, leaning back in my chair.
“You okay?” Derek asks me for the millionth time.
“No,” I snap at him. I don’t mean to snap at him. I’m tired of the question, and I miss my dad. I feel like I would have snapped at anyone who dared to ask me a question right now. Derek doesn’t say anything; he just nods and squeezes my knee, then he gets up and heads into the house.
“Be nice,” Aiden warns.
“Oh, I thought you would be all for me being mean to Derek.”
“I don’t want you to be mean to him for no reason, Audrey.”
The question that has been on the tip of my tongue since we got home finally comes out. “Did Dale leak the location of Dad’s funeral? Is that why all the press was there?”
Brent shakes his head. “He’s a lot of things, but no he didn’t. He actually had no idea that the funeral was being held there. I’m guessing we were followed. There’s security waiting out there for when you decide to go home. And that will stick with you for a while. He made sure of it.” Brent gestures at Derek, who’s joined us on the deck again.
“Thank you,” I say to Derek, hoping it helps with the bitchiness that slipped into my tone earlier. I see he brought his guitar out with him.
